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Mallikarjun Kharge, a senior Congress leader, will be next in line to become the leader of opposition in Rajya Sabha after Gulam Nabi Azad.
Congress President and UPA Chairperson Sonia Gandhi wrote to the Vice President M. Venkaiah Naidu for electing Kharge for the role of leader of the opposition. Azad will complete his tenure as the member of Rajya Sabha on 15th February 2021. He served as a member of the Upper House of J&K before it turned into the Union Territory or post abrogation. UPA Chairperson Sonia Gandhi
The upcoming LOP hails from the state of Karnataka. He was a Dalit leader of the Congress party from 2014 to 2019. He was also the MLA of Karnataka for the ninth time. He remained the MP in Lok Sabha for the second time. He lost the 2019 general elections from Gulbarga, Karnataka with over 9500 votes. PM Modi once appreciated him for his constructive debate on national issues.
The party had a hard time choosing its head of the opposition in the previous and current general election as there mandate was less than 10 per cent in the Lower House. He is known for being the Gandhi loyalist and his oratory skills are on par with the Late Bjp leader like Sushma Swaraj and Arun Jaitley.
In the coming days, he will become the 17th leader of the opposition since December 1969. The very first LOP was Shyam Nadan Mishra followed by MS Gurupadaswamy, Kamalapti Tripathi, Bhila Paswan Shastri, LK Adwani, P Shiv Shankar, Jaipal Reddy, Sikander Bakht, SB Chavan, Manmohan Singh, Jaswant Singh, Arun Jaitley and Gulam Nabi Azad. Out of all leaders, Azad had the longest period of tenure for about 6 years and 9 months.
Kharge was the sole option for this position. Anand Sharma, deputy leader of the party in Rajya Sabha, Former Chief Minister of MP, Digvijay Singh and Ex-Union Minister P. Chidambaram were among the choices for the role of LOP.
On Tuesday, February 9th, PM Modi in his 13 min long speech broke down while bidding farewell to the Former Opposition Leader in the midst of the Government- Opposition standoff on the farm laws.